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On June 13th (1927) David Gordon Kirkpatrick was born. The world would come to know him as Slim Dusty and on the 13th June each year we increasingly now celebrate Slim Dusty Day as a tribute to the very real Aussie legacy he left behind 13 years ago. It’s a good thing Slim adopted “13” as his lucky number!

This year we ask the question “What Does Slim Dusty Mean To You?” A montage of messages was collected from friends, family and fans and compiled into a stirring video created by media company Cadence Media. Rich Thompson, Director of Cadence Media, reflects on the process, “We saw how everyone responded to Slim Dusty – the man and his music – through social media, at the Slim Dusty Centre in Kempsey and in letters posted over the years. To celebrate and embrace this collective love and respect it needed to be a collaboration of music, vision, and messages. It was a privilege to be involved in this special tribute.”

Launching the video on Facebook today it received a strong global response. Featuring vision from inside the Kempsey Slim Dusty Centre Museum as well as messages from fans and personalities including the likes of Troy Cassar-Daley, Lee Kernaghan, Beccy Cole, Brendan Nelson, Colin Buchanan, Warren H Williams, Pete Denahy, The Wiggles, Ray Hadley, Felicity Urquhart and Don Spencer. The video also includes some Kempsey locals who have forever embraced their local hero.

Messages from around the world are flooding in as people share their own story of Slim. Log in to Facebook, have a read, and post your own message/photo of what Slim means to you – add your part to the Slim Dusty story.

Another highlight of this year’s celebrations will be the official launch of an exciting, new and exclusive Slim Dusty Movie Exhibition at the Slim Dusty Centre in Kempsey. This additional exhibition is dedicated solely to Slim and Joy McKean’s ground-breaking 1984 docudrama The Slim Dusty Movie. Only showing for a limited time, the new exhibition will feature props, costumes and memorabilia plus many previously unreleased/unseen behind the scenes images from the movie.

To further celebrate this occasion, EMI Music has released a special Limited Edition vinyl LP of Slim’s 100th album Looking Forward, Looking Back. Originally released on CD and cassette, the album has been meticulously represented in the vinyl format for the first time ever with a special gatefold sleeve packaging.

The Limited EditionLooking Forward, Looking Back vinyl is available to order now from the Slim Dusty website and all good music stores:

Over his long career Slim Dusty sold hundreds-of-thousands of vinyl albums, so it is fitting to again see Slim riding the crest of the current vinyl revival wave. Following the success of last year’s TheDen Tapes vinyl LP (and CD) release, on June 10 EMI /Universal Music will release Slim Dusty’s iconic Looking Forward Looking Backalbum as a LIMITED EDITION vinyl LP with a special gatefold sleeve packaging.

This will be the very first time this multi-platinum album has been made available on vinyl (only available previously on CD and cassette). The Looking Forward Looking Back album originally released in 2000 was a landmark album in so many ways for Slim. Not only was it a historic album for Slim being his 100th album release, but it was also such a huge success album for the 73 year old Aussie ‘King of Country’. The album achieved Top 5 success in the ARIA mainstream /pop chart (and #1 in the ARIA Country Chart), triple Platinum album sales and led to Slim winning his first ARIA Album Award (2001 ‘Best Country Album’ Award). Slim had previously been presented with ARIA’s prestigious Hall of Fame Award and the Special Achievement Award.

Back in 2000, Looking Forward Looking Backwas celebrated with a special Channel 9 This Is Your Life event presentation by Mike Munro. Remarkably this was the second time the show’s producers had honoured Slim with a This Is Your Life tribute (the first was back in 1974). Looking Forward Looking Back celebrated a freshness and new diversity for Australia’s Country Music scene both in its writing style and musicality. The album featured a powerful duet with another country music star, Kasey Chambers (on the track Matilda No More). As well as featuring Slim’s own songs the album include an eclectic selection of songs written for Slim by Don Walker (Cold Chisel), Norma O’Hara Murphy, Eric Bogle, Peter Denahy, Kevin ‘Bloody’ Wilson and of course Slim’s wife Joy McKean.

This special vinyl release commemorates 13 years since Slim’s passing and reflects on the strong legacy Slim left behind for Australia, one which endures through his music and through the recently opened Slim Dusty Centre (in Kempsey, NSW). This year would have been Slim’s 89th birthday on June 13 (a date many now affectionately refer to as ‘Slim Dusty Day’). Coincidently, many years ago Slim had adopted “13” as his lucky number and it seems appropriate that this special Limited Edition vinyl release captures and celebrates these milestones and events.

The limited editionLooking Forward Looking Back vinyl is available to pre-order now from the Slim Dusty website and all good music stores:

To coincide with the long awaited opening of The Slim Dusty Centreand Museum in Kempsey in November, EMI Music is proud to announce the release of a new Slim Dusty album, The Den Tapes. Released on November 13th, the new album features all previously unreleased recordings by Australia’s legendary King of Country. These are the last known unreleased recordings by Slim Dusty.

The Den Tapes is a 10 song collection of recently unearthed solo material recorded on cassette by Slim himself in his small office ‘den’ at home. These unique solo acoustic recordings show Slim’s raw talent at its very best. His relaxed performances on this collection of home recordings are pure and simply brilliant…and it is simply Slim’s voice and a guitar!

For posterity no doubt, sometime in the late 90’s, Slim started recording and collating these private recordings of his favourite songs from his youth. Traditional Aussie songs which he grew up listening to back on his family farm, they are songs which probablyinspired and shaped his own future musical direction. Slim’s longtime producer Rod Coe discovered this personal collection of solo recordings on a single cassette by sheer accident when looking for something else in Slim’s Den.

To quote Slim’s wife and songwriter Joy McKean: “The songs you have here are some of those he heard and learned from the radio and the old portable gramophone when he was just a quiet country boy up in the isolated Nulla Nulla Creek. Many decades later, as a nationally known and loved singer and travelling showman, he still turned to the old songs for the pure enjoyment of singing them”.

In a career spanning over so many audio and visual formats this latest release will be the first time a Slim Dusty album has been released simultaneously in three formats of Vinyl LP, CD and Digital download.

Leaving the final comments on The Den Tapes to Slim’s wife, Joy McKean says, “These recordings reveal a very happy album; a man and his guitar, singing for the absolute joy of it…just singing”.

The Slim Dusty Centre, in Slim’s hometown of Kempsey, is a multi purpose facility that includes a Museum, a Travelling Exhibition Gallery, a Visitors Centre, a retail shop called The General Store, a Function Centre and the Dusty’s Dinner Camp Café. What began as a conversation backstage after a show between Slim Dusty AO MBE, Joy McKean OAM and some members of the Macleay Valley Coast community, has resulted in the much anticipated Slim Dusty Centre which will open its doors to the public from October 17 ahead of the official gala opening on November 19.

The Den Tapes will be available on CD, Digital & Limited Edition Vinyl LP

It might be surprising for Slim Dusty fans to learn that the number of Golden Guitars won by the legendary Australian, Slim Dusty, has increased from 37 to 38, despite the fact that Slim died some 12 years ago in 2003. In fact, neither Slim nor his music, has won another of the prized trophies presented in Tamworth each year in January. It’s simply a matter of rectifying a mistake that was made in the statistics many decades ago.

The inaugural Australasian Country Music Awards were staged by Radio 2TM in the Tamworth Town Hall on a very hot Sunday night on January 28th 1973. The initial Award that compere Kevin Knapp announced that historic night was for APRA Song of The Year. To present the Award, well known composer, George Dasey (They’re a Weird Mob), was invited to the stage and he presented the first ever Golden Guitar to Joy McKean for her composition “Lights On The Hill”.

For many years Slim has been credited for winning only two Golden Guitars at those first Awards in 1973. One was for the Best EP or Single (Lights on the Hill) and another for the Best 12” LP Album (Me And My Guitar). But, recently, Joy McKean and Anne Kirkpatrick have been going through the collection of Slim memorabilia, preparing it for the move to The Slim Dusty Centre in Kempsey later this year, and discovered an extra Golden Guitar from 1973 and were puzzled about it. They wondered if it could be a duplicate they had acquired for some reason.

However, after checking a rare tape recording of the first Awards in 1973, from the Tamworth Sound and Film Archive, it was discovered that Slim had also been awarded a Golden Guitar as the artist who sang Joy’s Best Composition, (Lights On The Hill). So now we know that Slim won three Golden Guitars in January 1973, and not the two that had been counted previously. Things changed considerably in later presentations; 2TM dropped the Golden Guitar for the singer of the Best Composition and also, Golden Guitars given to winning record companies were dropped.

With the Slim Dusty Centre in Kempsey nearing completion, it is appropriate that the great Slim Dusty is now credited with the third forgotten trophy he won in 1973, bringing his grand total up to 38 Golden Guitars awards, unmatched to date.

Commenting on the change, the Secretary of the Country Music Association of Australia, Meryl Davis said, “It’s great to see Slim’s tally of Golden Guitars being updated. As a person who contributed so much to Australian country music, Slim deserves all the recognition and thanks we can give him. It will be exciting to see the Golden Guitars he won, on display in the Slim Dusty Centre.”

All of Slim’s 38 Golden Guitars awards will be on display in a special feature at the Slim Dusty Museum in Kempsey when it opens in October this year.